New Clothes
by Lady Lychee
Summary: Clementine has grown, so Christa decides to take her to the mall to get new clothes. (One-shot)(T for language)


"Are you sure this is a good idea? I'm okay like this." Clementine whispered as she looked around the deserted town.

"It'll be fine, Clem." Christa smiled back at Clementine as she quietly pushed the door to an abandoned mall open.

Buildings lay in ruin and corpses littered the streets. The bright, blue sky contrasted greatly against the decay of the world below. Clementine had turned eleven a few days prior and had mentioned that her clothes were a bit harder to move in, which Christa knew was a problem. Clementine had grown taller, too, and soon, she would need better clothes. Christa glanced at Clementine, who absentmindedly tugged at the hem of her skirt. The door closed with a soft _thud_ behind them.

"Clem," Christa looked around the dark shopping mall, pausing to listen for nearby walkers. All seemed quiet, "We need to get you some pants. Jeans. Jeans are always reliable and they last for a long time."

"Okay. I was getting tired of this dress, anyway." Clementine smiled up at her.

"Good. Remember that whenever you need clothes, you need to get clothes that fit. Dresses, skirts, big shirts, all of those are dangerous. They can get caught or grabbed by things. Got it?" Christa spied a directory across from them and walked over to it. Hopefully, there would be clothes in one of these stores. She didn't have time to look in every store. "Here, Cover me while I look at this. We have to be quick."

"But my mom always said to get clothes bigger than I should so I could grow into them." Clementine held her pistol up as she scanned the area around them.

"...Right, but try to find things that are only a size or two bigger. Then it won't drag around as much."

There were three stores that would possibly work. They were department stores that would hopefully have some clothes left. They probably wouldn't be very cute or pretty, but it was better than nothing. Christa nodded to Clementine and they both set off toward the first department store, avoiding a few straggling walkers. The mall was covered in overgrowth and bodies. The models that paraded around the faded advertisements seemed alien to the two as they passed various stores.

"You know, it's weird that everyone wanted bodies like them." Christa muttered in response to seeing a particularly thin model. "Now, we don't have a choice. Used to wish I could be as thin as them. Now I'd give anything to not see my ribs."

"In Miss Moore's class, I had a friend who thought she was fat. She wanted to look like them really bad." Clementine looked up at the model.

"What?" Christa looked at her in surprise, "But you were in what, first grade? What first grader thinks like that?"

"I dunno. She wasn't fat at all. She was as skinny as I am. She said she wanted to be a model." Clementine shrugged. "She had to go to the hospital because she wasn't eating."

"What the fuck?" Christa looked back at the model. She hated to think what looking at those models all the time did to little girls. Hell, she knew people her age who did the same thing. Maybe it was a good thing that they didn't have to stare at them every moment of the day.

"Swear."

"Sorry."

After a few minutes of searching and hiding, Christa and Clementine found the first

department store. It lay in mostly ruins, tattered banners boasting the "biggest sale of the season" lay around the floor. A few racks of clothes lay untouched while the rest was strewn around the floor. Christa knelt and picked up a dirty, yellow shirt. Too big, low cut, and just plain ugly. She put dropped it back onto the floor.

"Okay, Clem. Let's go look. Remember. You need pants and a shirt. If you find something else you want, check with me, okay? We don't want you to wear something that could be dangerous."

"Got it."

Christa took Clementine's hand and they walked around, checking for clothes that would fit the young girl. Most of the clothing was either much too big or too small for her. They continued to search through the scattered clothes, their hope dwindling as they traveled towards the girls' section. They searched the racks, only finding clothes unsuitable to wear during a zombie apocalypse. Christa threw a shirt onto the ground with a sigh.

"I found some pants!" Clementine held up a pair of pants with a grin. They were decent enough and were surprisingly clean considering the rest of the clothing.

"Good job, Clem. There's a changing room over there. Go put it on." Christa followed Clementine as she carefully stepped into the changing room. She peeked into each of the changing stalls before she nodded to Clementine. The room was safe. The young girl ran into a stall with a grin.

"Christa, don't you need clothes too?" Clementine asked as she changed.

"I'm an adult, so I don't grow. I don't need new clothes." Christa smiled.

"Oh. But still. When are we gonna have time to find more clothes? You should get some extra clothes. Just in case."

"Good point."

"Ta-da!" Clementine opened the door and stepped out. The pants seemed to fit her well and she seemed to be able to move in them.

"You look great. How do they feel? Can you move around in them?"

Clementine crouched and jumped. "Yep! I can move. Plus, these pockets look huge." She tried to stuff her hands into the pockets when her expression of joy changed into annoyance. "These are fake!"

Christa sighed, "Of course they are. I'm sorry, Clem. Let's try to find another pair. We can keep those in case you need another."

"Boys never had this problem. They always have huge pockets." Clementine huffed as she followed Christa out of the changing room. "At least the back pockets are big."

Christa looked around, "Let's go find some boys' jeans. They'll have bigger pockets. Which are important."

"I have to wear boy clothes?" Clementine pouted.

"Believe me, it's better to wear boy clothes than have fake pockets." Christa smiled and took Clementine's hand. "Let's go."

The two set off to search the rest of the store. Every so often, they would find a pair of pants, though it usually didn't fit. After they searched most of the store, they found various articles of clothing that the two liked, though they didn't have a need for. Other than that, however, they were unable to find anything of use and left the store to go to the next one. It was a larger department store with, hopefully, more options.

They slowly combed the second store for clothing, only to find even less than the first.

Christa sighed in frustration as she stood. Was there really nothing? She looked back down at the pile she had been searching through.

"There's nothing here." Christa threw a red shirt onto the pile.

"Let's keep looking. We'll find something." Clementine grinned as she held up a purple and white, long sleeved shirt. "See?"

"I guess you're right." Christa smiled. "Go try it on while I try to find something, okay?"

"Okay!" Clementine ran into to the dressing room, clutching the shirt to her chest excitedly.

Christa smiled as she picked up a white t-shirt, "Well, better than nothing." She took off her purple jacket and pulled it over her head. The new shirt felt strange against her skin as she pulled the jacket back on. She looked up as she realized that she hadn't heard from Clementine in a few minutes. She walked toward the dressing room slowly, "Clem, you okay?"

A door opened and Clementine stepped out, her arms crossed over her chest. "This shirt is see through."

"Well, at least it's a shirt," Christa sighed, "Let's go find a shirt to put over it. And maybe a tank top under it. It'll keep you warm, at least."

"Okay." Clementine fell into step beside Christa as they left the store. "How come girls' clothes are so annoying?"

"What do you mean?" Christa looked down.

"They're see through and have fake pockets."

"I dunno, Clem." Christa shrugged as she looked around at the abandoned stores, "That's just how they were."

"It isn't right."

"Well, they weren't built for our world. But, it'll be fine. We'll just look for boy clothes. They're probably more comfy anyway." Christa pulled Clementine behind a large, standing advertisement as a walker passed them. "Okay. Let's hurry up, find whatever we can and get out of here. It looks like more of them are coming."

"Okay," Clementine whispered.

Clementine peeked around the side of the advertisement before she nodded at Christa. They crept toward a bench and into the store, narrowly avoiding the attention of a walker. Christa sighed in relief as she looked around for a melee weapon. Hopefully, she wouldn't have to use it.

"Clem, do you see anything I can use to bash a skull in?" She looked around as she spotted a purple t-shirt. She grabbed it, a smile on her lips.

"What about that thing?" Clementine pointed to a hook used to grab items off of out-of-reach items on racks.

"Good job. Here," Christa handed her the shirt, "Put this on while I grab that. Yell if you need help."

As Clementine quickly pulled her hat off to slip the shirt over her head, Christa jumped up to grab the hook as quickly as she could. She grabbed it quickly and turned to run back Clementine when a walker turned the corner.

"Shit," Christa backed against the wall as the walker began to stumble toward her. If she used her gun, she'd likely attract the rest of the walkers to their location. She hefted the hook in her hand and ran forward, raising it above her head. As the walker groaned, she brought it down as hard as she could, bringing the walker to the ground, but not killing it. She brought the hook down onto the walker's face as quickly as she could. The grotesque noise of the hook hitting the soft flesh echoed in the somewhat empty store as blood splattered onto the floor and Christa. Eventually, it stopped moving and Christa sighed in relief. Luckily, no other walkers seemed to have been alerted and she looked up.

Clementine held her own hook, blood splattered onto her face. "It's dead, right?"

"Yeah, it's dead." Christa wiped her forehead. "Find anything else while I was, uh, busy?"

"I found a cami and put it on." She adjusted her hat, "It was kinda awkward, but you weren't looking, so it was probably okay. Plus, I got this." She held up the hook.

"Good job. Now, let's find you some better pants. Maybe some shoes, too. If I remember anything about this store, we should be able to find some good stuff."

Clementine seemed to brighten at the mention of shoes, "Hopefully they'll be my size, too."

"Hopefully." Christa chuckled and looked around. "I think they were this way." She walked toward the east end of the store, the hook raised.

"Christa!" Clementine tugged on her shirt as she pointed to an orange jacket strewn on the ground, "Look! You can wear that." She crept toward it and picked it up. She held it up with a grin. "And it feels warm, too."

"Thanks, Clem," She took it from the girl and pulled it on after taking off her jacket and stuffing it into her backpack. "Feels nice."

"You're welcome. Think there are any shoes left?"

"Maybe. They should be about here, so just look for something." She knelt beside an overturned display. There were only a few empty boxes and stray shoes. She used the bloody hook to pull the shoes out from under the display, hoping that some of them would be pairs. A boot, a tennis shoe, a sneaker, a pair of heels.. she sighed. It would be a miracle to find a pair of shoes in the same size, much less a pair. She crawled toward another display.

Clementine cried out in fear as she was met face-to-face with a corpse and backed into a shelf, knocking it over. She winced at the loud bang against the store's tile floor.

"Are you okay?!" Christa stood immediately.

"Y-yeah! I'm okay." Clementine rubbed the back of her head as her gaze fell onto a closed shoebox. She grinned and opened it, finding a pair of converse. "Oh, thank God."

"I can't even find two shoes in the same size. How the hell did you find that?" Christa looked at the pair in disbelief.

"It's an answered prayer, I guess." Clementine grinned as she pulled off her too-small shoes to slip the new ones on.

"You're just a lucky girl." Christa snorted when she felt the hair rise on the back of her neck. She held her hand up to Clementine to quiet her and listened. The groan and moans of walkers were louder than they had been a few minutes prior. The shelf Clementine had knocked over had made enough noise to attract their attention.

"Fuck!" Christa jumped up, "Clem, do you have those shoes on yet? Because we gotta go."

"I- yeah! I just need to tie them." Clementine looked down and grabbed the laces, her hands shaking.

"I hope you know how to tie fast, because here they come!" A walker rounded the corner and groaned loudly in response to seeing Christa, who held up the hook defensively.

"R-rabbit goes into the hole…" Clementine's fingers slipped and the laces fell to the floor. "Christa, I-I can't remember how to tie-"

"Clem, you're eleven!" Christa knelt and tied the laces sloppily before tucking them behind the tongue of the shoe. "Let's go!"

She took Clementine's hand and pulled her up. The two ran away from the few walkers that followed behind them and toward the doors leading outside. Christa slammed into the first set of doors to open them and Clementine pushed the second open. They ran as quickly as they could away from the mall.


End file.
